...Case You're Wondering If I Wish You Wouldn't Talk So Much

PAD Challenge day 4: For today’s prompt, take the phrase “Case (blank);” replace the blank with a word or phrase; make the new phrase the title of your poem; and then, write your poem. Possible titles include: “Case of Water,” “Case in Point,” “Case Study,” and “Case of the Missing Person.”

I hope everyone has a case of easy poeming today!

In this age of texting and all other phone-fixations,

Chatter has become cherished artwork 

even if most of it fades with the hour!

somehow when her kitchen is filled with chatter,

mother doesn't worry so much

if something's the matter

There is nothing quite like children to revive in us the art of 'chattering':)

They love to be talked to and listened to...

...a chat for their ears only on a fine afternoon

 (I wonder if they remember what they were discussing;-)

The ways of words

Ah, who can count

What most will amount to?

The poetry

Of you and me

A blip upon the blue

Our chatter

Yester-afternoon

Has scattered like its hours

The bloom of speech

Forgotten soon

Save a few chosen flow’rs

But I would rather

Hear the chatter

That soon fades away

Than listen to you

Looking at me (or your phone)

With nothing to say

© Janet Martin

Top photo cropped from this performance where at 14 mos. old clatter is as exciting as chatter!

A Share It or Keep It Challenge...

Oh! Those awful times when we wish we could unspeak what we spoke in haste...

 So many words to chose from...their sequence is Crucial!

Wise to put them through the 'humble and kind' test

Do you have a word to say

That would keep gloom’s clouds at bay

That could stir a prayer, a song

When life’s hurt weighs hard and long

Share it, share it, share it

Do you have a word to tell

That could save a soul from hell

That could lift the heart downcast

That could help faith to hold fast

Share it, share it, share it

Do you have a word to spurt

That would shame or blame or hurt

That would cause someone to fall

That could scar the hidden soul

Keep it, keep it, keep it

© Janet Martin

War of Words

Day 27: For today’s prompt, take the phrase “(blank) Of (blank),” replace the blanks with a word or phrase, make the new phrase the title of your poem, and then, write your poem.

so little won

and so much lost

when war of words

tallies the cost

Janet Martin

Soul-speech

As for me, I will be vindicated and will see your face;
    when I awake, I will be satisfied with seeing your likeness.

Psalm 17:15

The wellspring of wonder never runs dry

If the heart is in tune with The Giver

So, sometimes we just stand and let the eye

Hear what words cannot deliver

Thought garners words within its reach

And fumbles, oft with vain appeal

To satisfy through its beseech

The tempest of fathoms we feel

Grief-loss, hope-joy evokes the tongue

To utter words it cannot free

Save stutters, while the heart is wrung

With sentimental empathy

Thus, when the best of thought is mute

And mouth inept where words beguile

We resort to word’s deeper root

A touch, a hug, a tear, a smile

© Janet Martin

Sometimes the wellspring of words is parched as we struggle to pen wonder 

or heart-hunger in full measure!

A Few Words About Words...

Some words spur us on

Inspire us to live

Each moment

Like a gift,

So glad and kind

Some words drag us down

A millstone ‘round the neck

They choke the joy

From heart and soul

And mind

Would then, the words we speak

Seek to cheer the day

For none of us 

Can know

How many 

We have left

To say

© Janet Martin

 Likewise, the tongue is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts. 

Consider what a great forest is set on fire by a small spark.

James 3:5

Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing.

1 Thess. 5:11

We never really outgrow songs like this:

Important Business, This Poetry

PAD Challenge Day 28: For today’s prompt, take the phrase “Important (blank),” replace the blank with a word or phrase, make the new phrase the title of your poem, and then, write the poem.

Important business this, the art

Of baring pieces of the heart

For stranger’s eyes to criticize

Or interpret, at least in part

Important business this, the dare

To splay heart pieces on thin air

For other lips and fingertips

To touch with much less thought or care

Important business this, the taunt

Of restless air requesting font

With lowly pen we trace its yen

And draw a poem from its vaunt

Important business this, the ought

That shapes a word that shapes a thought

That shapes a mind; ah, be not blind

To those who find what ink has wrought

Important business this, for we

Who teach not eyes, but hearts to see

As we lay bare on naked air

Heart-pieces shaped in poetry

© Janet Martin